Mahogany

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT MAHOGANY - PAGE 4

By A digest of coming events, compiled by Helene Van Sickle | June 18, 2000

The Tempel Lipizzans, known as the "dancing white stallions," leap into action this summer as they mark the 42nd anniversary of their arrival in this country from Austria. The Lipizzans will perform promenades of classical dressage, or "horse ballets," as they take breathtaking leaps and lifts in their trademark "Airs Above the Ground" show. Guests are invited to tour the mahogany and brass show stables following the show. Shows are 10:30 a.m. Wednesdays and 1 p.m. Sundays through Aug. 30. Admission is $16, $13 for seniors and $6 for children ages 4 to 14. For more information, call 847-623-7272.

For the past 15 years, parishioners of St. Anne Catholic Church in Barrington have celebrated mass in a gymnasium, but that will change next month with the opening of a new church. The new building will have its first mass March 8, Ash Wednesday. Church officials had hoped to have the church ready for Christmas, but construction delays got in the way. "We thought Christmas would be a wonderful time to be in there," said Rev. John Dewes, pastor of St. Anne's. "Everyone is very excited.

How do you get to Boston furniture-maker Steve Postma's showroom? Surf right in. 'Net-surf, that is. On June 15, Postma, a 32-year-old specialist in contemporary pieces featuring veneered curves, unveiled his own Home Page on the World Wlde Web. The page showcases some of his most interesting works, such as a mahogany stereo cabinet shaped a bit like a big drum, priced at $4,500, an ash credenza, $3,300, and a semicircular mahogany serving...

So you don't have a lot of extra money for redecoration this year. Or perhaps, you don't see yourself becoming a homeowner in the near future. Then imagine a home on a smaller scale, without the burden of taxes. Fancy an upscale dollhouse that would mimic your dream mansion or colonial home. The possibilities are limitless in the business of dollhouse making and decorating. Hildegard Popoff opened her Frankfort specialty shop, All Small, in 1986, because she loves dollhouses and the myriad miniatures that adorn them.

Charles Spencer, the 9th Earl of Spencer (a.k.a. brother of the late Diana, Princess of Wales), travels to the Chicago area in September on a North American tour to promote a line of furnishings. They're reproductions of things you'd find in Althorp, his family's 60,000-square-foot manse in the English countryside. You know: Tea caddies. Chests. Sofas. Lamps (one has a cannon mounted atop the shade). A Regency mahogany Sutherland table. A George III carved wood mirror. A carved pickled pine Spencer family crest.

In a corner of the antiques mall sits a dining-room chair that surely has seen better days. The finish is dark and scuffed. The tapestry seat is ruined. The cover under the seat is in shreds. Most shoppers would pass it by, but not one. A familiar character in a plaid shirt with wire spectacles selects the piece from surrounding bric-a-brac and admires it like a fine painting. The chair is the work of a skilled craftsman, a bargain in fine-grade mahogany that's just simple steps away from its former glory.

In a part of the world where government offices are frequently little more than overcrowded rooms tucked away in dirty and decaying buildings, Guatemala's National Palace shines like a rare jewel. Fussed over by a legion of soldiers who spend their days painting, polishing and primping the green granite structure, the palace is a perfectly preserved masterpiece. Nowhere else in Central America does a government have such a splendid place from which to govern. The graceful structure on the capital's main square has the appearance of a building constructed in the middle of the last century, but it was built from January, 1939, to November, 1943.

Encore: The Art Institute of Chicago is reopening its comprehensive American arts collection, which has been in storage. The collection includes paintings, sculpture, furniture and masterpiece silver from the 17th, 18th and 19th Centuries. Furniture selections will include a mahogany clock with brass inlay designed by the Chicago firm of George Grant Elmslie and William Purcell; a mahogany and white pine dressing table from Salem, Mass.; mahogany bureau table with maple, chestnut and white pine, attributed to John Townsend of Newport, R.I. Examples of American silver are a pair of candlesticks by John Noyes of Boston, a tea/coffee urn by Ephraim Brasher of New York.

Four years ago in the booming southwest suburbs, as the Archdiocese of Chicago struggled with declining city Roman Catholic parishes, the seeds were sown for a robust new church in Orland Hills. St. Elizabeth Seton Church, a spinoff from another burgeoning suburban parish, began holding mass in a Tinley Park high school in 1987 while designing its new home from scratch. On Sunday, all the planning, building and fundraising of the 2,300 families in the parish will culminate in the formal blessing of a new $3.2 million church.